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Heresy

paulgraham.com

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Re: Heresy

#611

Post by NoraCodes »

AlexTrask wrote: post #604
NoraCodes wrote: post #498

> The reason the current wave of intolerance comes from the left is simply because the new unifying ideology happened to come from the left. The next one might come from the right. Imagine what that would be like. I'm curious how Mr. Graham can look at a country that is in the process of reversing much of the last half-century's progress on women's rights, LGBTQ+ rights, and disability rights, and _not_ see a politic…

I think that Mr.Graham is not talking about rights and progress. curl -sb -H " http://paulgraham.com/heresy.html " | grep "right" one will be the last. There are aggressively conventional-minded people on both the right come from the left. The next one might come from the right. Imagine when, like the medieval church, they say "Damn right we're banning

`grep` is not the solution to every problem, friend. Not using exactly the same words does not mean we are not discussing the same topic.

Re: Heresy

#612

Post by lukifer »

tootie wrote: post #407
galaxyLogic wrote: post #393

Another word for heresy is political correctness. The problem with it is you can attack anybody you dislike with very little cost to you because you stand with a large crowd agreeing with you. And you don't even have to understand the issues since the opinion you put out is commonly accepted. It in fact might not be your opinion but you can still use it to attack opponents. Political correctness is a quite naturally…

Political correctness was an epithet invented by conservatives who opposed things like women's rights, gay rights etc. The fact that advocates can be mistaken doesn't overshadow how wrong the other side is to be unwilling to acknowledge injustice.

It does not follow that every reaction to injustice is inherently justice. As an exaggerated example, if the punishment for shoplifting was death, I can oppose that punishment without being in favor of shoplifting.

Obviously, those who criticize overreach of responses to injustice, will inevitably find themselves in common cause with reactionaries who do genuinely oppose progress, whether they want to or not. But that's all the more reason to be tolerant of good-faith dissent: the alternative is no one trusts anyone, and good-faith dissent itself becomes coded as a reactionary trick.

Re: Heresy

#613

Post by waqf »

ss108 wrote: post #552
Biologist123 wrote: post #220

This essay was somewhat high on opinion, somewhat low on evidence. Paul Graham tweets a lot about this issue, and cancel culture is something he is apparently very sensitive too. It makes me wonder what happened - as given his lack of evidence - it appears to be an emotional reaction rather than a logical one. As an aside, most examples of people being fired for expressing opinions seem to come from academia. I’ve wo…

I am not generally pro cancel culture, but a lot of the opposition to it is certainly whiney and low on evidence. For example, there's this notion that the advancement of knowledge is somehow being suppressed and that naked, barely-regulated free speech has been essential to Western dominance, and that, accordingly, to backpedal on the principle would have some material affect on society. However, no nexus between th…

But in actual intellectual discourse, if someone presents a point of view which is founded on a discredited idea, then we just ignore them. We do not show up at their talks and try to prevent them from communicating with others.

Firstly because life's too short for that, and secondly because who knows, one day they might turn out to have been right or mostly right.

Re: Heresy

#614

Post by sanderjd »

randomtwiddler wrote: post #610
sanderjd wrote: post #369

> The reason the current wave of intolerance comes from the left is simply because the new unifying ideology happened to come from the left. This is an (aggressively?) conventional idea that I have an (I guess) heretical opinion about. I'm somewhat persuaded that there is a recent outbreak of intolerance for differing ideas and ideals (though I suspect every generation expresses a version of this opinion as they get…

Seems a false equivalency. The majority of the personalized destruction, cancelling, firing, etc, comes from one side.

This is a common claim that seems to be based more on vibes than on evidence.

Re: Heresy

#615

Post by version_five »

NoraCodes wrote: post #595
version_five wrote: post #589

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I'm curious how Mr. Graham can look at a country that is in the process of reversing much of the last half-century's progress on women's rights, LGBTQ+ rights, and disability rights, and _not_ see a politics of heresy emerging from the right I see the former (and maybe the latter, I honestly don't pay too much attention), but my interpretation is that a major culprit for any reversals in rights is the far left, who…

> the far left, who have upped demands from reasonable tolerance [...] to ridiculous [...] proportions that have caused the pushback. This is the equivalent of the schoolyard bully saying "I wouldn't have hit him if he hadn't asked for his lunch money back."

I don't really want to debate you in analogy space, but what I said was equivalent to "the bully already gave you your lunch money back, but you're not happy with that anymore and stand there continuing to taunt him and asking for more money (or to acknowledge his priviledge or something)."

My comment was giving my perception, anyway, I'm not trying to persuade.

Re: Heresy

#616

Post by ss108 »

waqf wrote: post #613
ss108 wrote: post #552

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I am not generally pro cancel culture, but a lot of the opposition to it is certainly whiney and low on evidence. For example, there's this notion that the advancement of knowledge is somehow being suppressed and that naked, barely-regulated free speech has been essential to Western dominance, and that, accordingly, to backpedal on the principle would have some material affect on society. However, no nexus between th…

But in actual intellectual discourse, if someone presents a point of view which is founded on a discredited idea, then we just ignore them. We do not show up at their talks and try to prevent them from communicating with others. Firstly because life's too short for that, and secondly because who knows, one day they might turn out to have been right or mostly right.

> But in actual intellectual discourse, if someone presents a point of view which is founded on a discredited idea, then we just ignore them. We do not show up at their talks and try to prevent them from communicating with others.

I (for the most part) agree; like I said, I am not generally a fan of contemporary cancel culture.

Are you Muslim btw, or is your username a coincidence?

Re: Heresy

#617

Post by [deleted] »

ss108 wrote: post #616
waqf wrote: post #613

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But in actual intellectual discourse, if someone presents a point of view which is founded on a discredited idea, then we just ignore them. We do not show up at their talks and try to prevent them from communicating with others. Firstly because life's too short for that, and secondly because who knows, one day they might turn out to have been right or mostly right.

> But in actual intellectual discourse, if someone presents a point of view which is founded on a discredited idea, then we just ignore them. We do not show up at their talks and try to prevent them from communicating with others. I (for the most part) agree; like I said, I am not generally a fan of contemporary cancel culture. Are you Muslim btw, or is your username a coincidence?

[deleted]

Re: Heresy

#618

Post by LudwigNagasena »

ScarletEmerald wrote: post #411
UnpossibleJim wrote: post #355

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think the problem with this argument is the free speech "is at an all time high if you zoom out a bit". This is much like the argument, "gun violence is at an all time low if you zoom out a bit" argument. Both of these statements are true in the macro, but if you look at the trends, they point to a very disturbing line. The call for the restriction of free speech on the right(1) and the left (2) have increased in v…

Quoted post unavailable.

It’s interesting how “I support rights of private companies but only when they do something totalitarian” has become such a common position in the US.

Re: Heresy

#619

Post by rilezg »

NoraCodes wrote: post #578
rilezg wrote: post #577

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Great points. I would also highlight the following: > The clearest evidence of this is that whether a statement is considered x-ist often depends on who said it. Truth doesn't work that way. The same statement can't be true when one person says it, but x-ist, and therefore false, when another person does. I would offer the analogy of a broken (analog) clock. If a broken clock says the time is ten o’clock, and the tim…

> Similarly, if someone says something that is technically true, but they are a person who often lies or has goals that harm others, then it is more important to note that they should not be trusted than that they are correct. This is a great analogy, but I'd go even further than this; someone can say something which is true, but in context use it to signal harmful intent. Saying "you know, that last commit from Jane…

Agreed. I was just imagining people posting publicly on social media, but good to say that situational context/audience also matters a ton when understanding a given statement. There is often much unspoken nuance/implications.

Re: Heresy

#620

Post by breck »

Ancapistani wrote: post #421
mjburgess wrote: post #322

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's a "truth vs. order" debate. PG is in highly stable environments where order isnt an issue, so he is more concerned about truth. Generally, when "x-isms" are accused, the issue is the break down of social order in the environment in which the accusations are made. It really doesnt matter if your x-ist point is true, if saying it, is an action which destabilizes (eg.,) the workplace. Most spaces aren't for discuss…

> It's a "truth vs. order" debate. > It really doesnt matter if your x-ist point is true, if saying it, is an action which destabilizes (eg.,) the workplace. I think this is pretty insightful. There are two things at play here that I think are being conflated - one is challenging certain concepts, and the other is challenge the social order that is predicated upon them. Let’s take racism as an example. Arguing that r…

Its intriguing that PG used the term “anti-vaxers”, in this article. Being interested in the truth about vaccines will get you fired and the term “anti-vaxers” is used by the aggressively conventional minded to shut down debate. So I wonder if there’s subtext and those parts are him not meaning what he’s saying on the surface?

Anyway, the truth is if you’ve had COVID-19 you are far more protected than someone who got one of these vaccines. It is heretical to say that, and I get called an “anti-vaxer”, but it’s true.

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